


lucky seven minus one

by ThisShallNeverBeMentioned



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Alternate Canon, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Fix-It, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, POV Eddie Kaspbrak, Richie is the missing one instead of Stan
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-27
Updated: 2020-04-01
Packaged: 2021-03-01 10:42:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 17,530
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23350093
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThisShallNeverBeMentioned/pseuds/ThisShallNeverBeMentioned
Summary: Six losers return to Derry after 27 years to fight a horror from their childhood.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 7
Kudos: 41





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've been writing this on and off for over two months (along with a couple other IT fics) so to force myself to just sit down and finish it I'm gonna start posting. Enjoy!

Richie Tozier drives into Maine on a Tuesday morning.

It’s not planned; not the state, nor the day, nor the driving. The red convertible was picked up from a rental place in Chicago on a Sunday, signed over within fifteen minutes of him walking into the office, and with no set end-date given, paid for with a credit card on a day-by-day basis.

By mid-morning that same red convertible pulls over on the outskirts of a small town, Tozier gets out and looks around, seemingly picks a direction at random and starts walking.

His phone buzzes on the dashboard of the car.

/ / /

Eddie Kaspbrak is having a horrible day.

He doesn’t usually prescribe to the old adage “bad luck comes in threes”, but after a phonecall-induced car crash, an influx of childhood memories that were so repressed he’d forgotten there was ever anything _to_ repress, and a flash decision to tell his wife of fifteen years that he wants a divorce, well, he might need to reassess.

He feels like he needs to reassess a lot of things about his life.

And so, to keep in the spirit of things, three aspirin, two hastily packed suitcases, and one screaming match later, he’s on a plane to Bangor airport, booking a rental car and organising for it to be waiting for him when he lands.

The drive into Derry is yet another horrible trip down memory lane, half-memories that don’t quite make sense and that slip away if he tries to focus on them. It’s enough to make him debate whether taking another couple aspirin to quell his stirring headache is worth the increased risk of heart failure. He’s thankful at least to be distracted by checking in to the townhouse and hauling his luggage up to his stuck-in-the-eighties-styled room. He cursorily unpacks a few essentials, his toiletry bag and his travel pillow among them, but doesn’t linger too long over what essentially is now the entirety of his possessions stuffed into two suitcases. Because he knows Myra will want to keep the apartment and everything in it, and Eddie finds himself unable to care about fighting her over that.

Still, it’s a little much to think about all at once, so instead he just heads downstairs to drive over to the Chinese restaurant Mike told him to meet at.

He knows he never ate at the restaurant when he still lived here, because his mother would have never agreed to any sort of food that wasn’t 100% prepackaged TV dinners or casseroles, and he never had any cause to go out to dinner before he left for New York. Even then he kept away from most restaurants that didn’t serve something safe like steak and vegetables, or plain pasta, whatever had the least risk of salmonella and the shortest ingredients list. Then he started dating Myra, and over time going out to eat got whittled away as his list of food allergies grew.

His _alleged_ allergies.

That’s another thing that’s slowly coming back to him as he goes over his dietry restrictions with the waitress who escorts him through; more than half of the things he lists by rote he is suddenly sure he remembers eating in some form or other as a kid, as a teenager, as a young adult surviving on instant noodles and take away during college.

“-and if I eat a cashew I could realistically…” he trails off as two people, strangers but not, an overlaid image of young faces so familiar, grown up but somehow still the same, and of course, _of course_ he knows them. How could he ever forget two of his best friends in the entire world? “…die.”

Bill and Mike greet him, Mike more enthusiastically but Bill just as warmly, and Eddie sees the same sort of recognition crossing his face as Eddie feels. The feeling continues when Beverly and Ben enter the room, grows and swells and makes him feel an emptiness he hadn’t realised was there start to fill, and then Stan walks in with hesitation written across his face and the emptinesss shrinks again.

The food comes out, along with the drinks, and Eddie very quickly finds himself ignoring his own bland order, reaching for dumplings and egg rolls, swept up in the thrill of reconnecting with his friends, the best friends he’s ever had and somehow never realised he’d forgotten for so many years.

At one point when the topic of marriage comes up, there’s gentle teasing and wondering over how Ben and Mike were somehow the only two of them all _not_ married, despite a general concensus that Mike had always seemed perfect partner material and Ben had by far been the most romantic out of all of them. Mike laughs, and Ben waves them off with pink cheeks, diverting to ask Stan about his wife, and Stan happily takes up the offer to talk with obviously a great amount of love and affection about Patty. There’s a slightly awkward moment where Eddie exchanges glances with Bev and Bill, and sees his own disillusionment with his marriage reflected back at him. He thinks all three of them realise their shared regret when not one of them bothers to bring up their own spouses in the wake of Stan talking so lovingly about his own.

Fortunately the conversation shifts from there.

Unfortunately it shifts to something much more horrifying.

“Pennywise.”

Beverly’s whisper sets loose a wave of new memories, the knowledge settling into his mind all at once of the monster that haunted them that one summer, and the words are spilling out of his mouth before he can even think about it.

“Oh, the fucking clown-” he gasps, and suddenly his throat is closing up and his lungs constrict, and he can see and hear the others reacting just as viscerally as he is even as he fumbles in his jacket for his inhaler, but it isn’t there, it’s in his toiletry bag because he hasn’t needed to carry it around daily for years, only every now and then during hayfever season-

Without anything else to wrap his fingers around he picks up his fortune cookie and starts spinning it in his hands, fidgeting and picking at it with his nails.

Mike starts to explain, and with every word he says Eddie feels himself shrink down into his seat – he looks at Stan at one point to see him looking white as a sheet, jaw clenched and eyes staring into the middle distance – and when Mike brings up the oath Eddie finally cracks the fortune cookie down the middle.

There’s only one word printed on the slip of paper inside, and for lack of anything else to say in the wake of the realisation of why they’re there, he says, “My fortune cookie just says _Play_.”

The others seem to take it as a cue, and one by one they crack their own open.

Stan clears his throat. “Mine says _Guess_.”

Bill shoves a piece of cookie into his mouth, frowns and stands, reaching across the table for Stan’s slip. “You wanna throw that over here?”

Mike and Ben pass their papers over as well, and Bill spreads them out on the table in a line. Eddie stands up to read the other words.

_Come. Play. Can’t. Guess. And._

“It’s a message.” Mike says, a thread of almost expectation in his voice.

Bill starts shuffling them around, and Eddie dutifully starts reciting the words in various orders alongside Ben and Mike, all of them trying to find some sort of sense, but it’s almost like something’s missing, some key or context, a missing piece of the puzzle to give the sentence structure.

Stan’s still sitting down in his chair, and even though they’re all speaking loudly over one another, arguing over meaning and reasoning, his voice cuts through their squabbling like a shot.

“Bev.”

They all fall silent, and turn to look, and Eddie feels dread creep up his spine as he takes in the look on her face.

Despite the wide eyes and twin tear tracks down her cheeks, her hand doesn’t shake as she places her paper on the table with the others.

_Richie._

There are several intakes of breath around the table. It feels like there’s water rushing through his head, muffling everything, and Eddie only distantly hears Bill murmur something before he rearranges the slips of paper.

And suddenly the words fall into place, easily, obviously, context found:

_Guess Richie Can’t Come And Play._

It’s like a punch straight to the gut, the name and the message riling for top position in Eddie’s brain, the memory of huge thick-lensed glasses and dark hair and a wide grin overlayed by the implication, the thought that the absence of one of their number is the result of the clown, of _It_ , the monster from their childhood-

“Why does it say Richie?” the question falls out of his mouth even though he knows why, _he knows_ , but he wants a different explanation, he wants a different meaning. “Why the fuck does it say Richie, someone _fucking answer me!_ ”

They stare back at him, helpless shock on their faces, and no one says a word, whether they don’t know what to say or because they all fall still at the sound of faint rattling.

The fucking fortune cookies start to shake in their bowl.

When the first one jumps out of its own volition, all of them jolt back from the table, Stan, Bev and Ben shoving backwards in their chairs. The cookie cracks, tiny chips falling off, being pushed out by-

“Oh, what the _fuck_ is that?”

Bill and Mike are somehow half leaning away and half-craning their necks forward to watch the grey insectoid legs push apart the pieces of cookie, thin strings of sticky membrane and then a _tiny baby’s head_ , part of the same creature, twisted and crying pitifully. It scrambles forward on the table cloth disturbingly quickly, knocking over a wine glass, and all of them are up on their feet now, backing away.

More of the fortune cookies flip their way out of the bowl, cracking and shaking and birthing more grey sticky monstrosities, too many limbs, too many eyes, and all too sick and diseased and _wrong_ -looking, writhing towards them and spreading out across the table.

“I don’t wanna be here,” Eddie feels his hands raise up, stuck between the childish desire to cover his face and not wanting to take his eyes off the creatures, hardly aware of what he’s saying. “I wanna go home, I don’t wanna be here, I can’t fucking do this, _I don’t wanna be here_ -”

Then suddenly there’s flying freaky creatures coming straight at him, and Ben is beside him trying to sort-of shield him whilst batting them out of the air. Eddie flails at them too and tries not to retch when he actually makes contact with one and it feels like hitting a crunchy ball of slime.

The bowl of fortune cookies shakes once more, and a dark, thick liquid starts bubbling up, sizzling over the lip of the bowl and across the table, spreading and growing and swallowing up the screaming creatures. Across the room Mike grabs a chair and starts beating it against the mass on the table, screaming, “It’s not real! It isn’t real! _It’s not real!_ ”

“Is everything alright?”

Everyone freezes.

The monstrosities are gone, as if they were never there at all.

The waitress, to her credit, seems incredibly unfazed considering they’re all plastered to the walls of the room and Mike is still mid-swing with a piece of furniture.

Stan clears his throat and says with a level of calm that’s belied by the wildness in his eyes, “I think we’re ready for the check.”

\ \ \

Outside, Eddie paces.

Bev had immediately lit up a cigarette, her hands shaking, and Bill and Stan had fallen on Mike with questions. There’s a frantic energy about them all, standing in a parking lot in the dark of Derry, fluorescent light reflections in the puddles and potholes of the bitumen. Eddie wonders if they all feel as jumpy as he does about the lack of city lights, the absent amber glow of civilisation, the way the darkness feels heavy on all sides, compressing and claustrophobic, and the instinct under his skin to just _run_.

But he can’t run.

So he paces.

“-brought us here, Mike? A bit of warning would have been nice.”

“You wouldn’t have been able to remember without coming back, and you _need_ to remember-”

“Well, what about that fucking message, huh?” Eddie puts in as he passes between the others, words spitting out fast as he pivots and paces away again. “About Richie? Why- How could It _know_ -”

“He said he was coming, didn’t he?” Ben asks. “You talked to him and he said he’d come?”

“I got a hold of his agent, he said he’d definitely pass the message along.” Mike says, though he doesn’t look as confident as he sounds. “And if the way you all reacted is any basis, just my name and the mention of Derry should have been enough for him to remember, right? So he’d come.”

“But where _is he_ , Mike?” Eddie’s going to wear holes in his shoes before long, or maybe give himself blisters, _oh god did he remember to pack blister bandaids?_ “And what the fuck was with those fortune cookies, that message-”

“Probably just _It_ trying to scare us-”

“He’s semi famous, it’s not like he can just go missing-”

“Maybe we should try calling again-”

“Like they’re going to tell a stranger anything-”

“Give me the number.” Stan interrupts, phone in hand, a hard sort of determination on his face.

Mike digs an old brick cell phone out of his pocket, scrolling through contacts before reciting the number off to Stan, and the others shift closer. Eddie forces himself to a standstill, still full of anxious energy but desperate to hear.

Stan puts his phone on loudspeaker as it rings, and Eddie thinks they must all be holding their breath as they wait, there’s barely any other sound. After what feels like way too many rings, the call connects, and a harried, nasal voice answers.

“ _Hello, this is the manager for Richie Tozier, who’s calling?”_

“Stanley Uris. I’m an old friend of Richie’s and I haven’t heard from him lately. He’s not answering his main phone. I was wondering if he was there with you?”

“ _He’s currently unavailable. If you want to leave your number-”_

“Is he there?” Stan interrupts, direct. “Is he with you?”

“ _N- uh- what- who is this again-?”_

“Is Richie Tozier currently in your line of sight, and if he isn’t when was the last time you saw him or heard from him?” There’s a long pause, but the call’s still active, and Stan’s voice softens, earnest. “Please, I’m just worried about my friend.”

A stream of static comes over the line, like someone sighing right into the mouthpiece.

“ _He’s taking some time off at the moment._ ” The voice admits. “ _A couple weeks_.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Eddie sees Bev put a hand up over her mouth.

“Did he say why?”

“ _Personal reasons._ ” The voice snips back, and then there’s another sigh. “ _Look, I’ll let him know you called when I can get a hold of him, just don’t expect a call back, he’s got a lot of tour dates to catch up on. Thanks for your call.”_

An extended beep signals the end of the call.

“So,” Eddie starts. “What does that mean?”

Stan frowns, exchanges a short glance with Mike. “I don’t know. It could mean nothing. But the timing of him being missing while we’re all here-”

“Time off doesn’t mean _missing_.”

“They wouldn’t admit it if he _was_ missing. And if he’s taking unexpected time off when he’s supposed to be on a tour-”

“He could just be having a midlife crisis or something!” Eddie points out, feeling a bit frantic. “We don’t _know_ if he came here, he could have never gotten Mike’s message, or- or he could be in fucking Bali or something, I don’t know!”

He knows he’s grasping a little, but it’s true that they have no way of knowing for sure where Richie is, no way to confirm one way or the other, and it would be just like the clown to manipulate them into thinking the worst, to scare them. That’s what it was doing with the fortune cookie message, with the creatures, and it _worked_. Suggestion can be a powerful tool. The threat of something bad happening being more worrying that the actual outcome is an occurrence Eddie is familiar with in his work, laying out worst-case scenarios and their likelihood, the inevitable fallout should any of them come to fruition, all powerful enough as hypotheticals to convince his clients to reassess.

So the facts are these: they have no proof Richie ever came back to Derry, particularly if he never directly got Mike’s message, and they know the clown plays on their fears, depends on it. Even the fortune cookie message itself was vague enough to not mean anything concrete.

“Either way,” Mike says, looking around at them. “We have to do something. That’s why you all came back, to honour your promise.”

/ / /

The conversation follows them back to the townhouse.

Eddie’s not proud of it, but the minute he gets inside he beelines upstairs to his room and digs around in his toiletries until he finds his old inhaler. He pulls the cap off and shakes it, still pacing idly around his room, but when he depresses it next to nothing comes out, just the barest hint of the medicinal taste on his tongue. He tries not to let it bother him too much, he’s not having any trouble breathing at the moment anyway, and he can just go and get a new one tomorrow at the pharmacy. They might even still have his old prescription in their records.

He still tucks the empty inhaler into his pocket, habit and familiarity helping ground him just a little.

Downstairs he follows the voices of the others into the lounge, and pauses in the doorway when he takes in the way they’re all leaning towards Bev, braced on the other side of the bar with a shot glass in hand and a bottle by her elbow.

“What’d I miss?” he asks, and five identical haunted faces turn to look at him.

Ben’s the one to break the silence. “Bev saw something.”

Eddie tenses, darts his eyes around the room. “Something as in- like the fortune cookies again?”

Ben shakes his head. “No, not like that, it was…” he trails off, glances back at Bev, and she meets his eyes and knocks back another shot.

“I’ve been seeing this vision of Richie, hanging in the Deadlights.”

He’s never felt the emptiness of his inhaler pressing so heavily on him like it is now. Eddie feels simultaneous pulls to run out of the room and grab one of the bottles from behind the bar. Instead of doing either he lets himself sink down until he’s perched on the arm of one of the lounge chairs.

“You- what?”

Bev takes a deep breath. “Every night for the past 27 years I’ve dreamt about our deaths. I never knew who any of you were but I always… it always hurt so much to watch, and not ever be able to help any of you. It wasn’t until Mike called and we came back here, until I saw all of you, that it all started to make sense to me.”

She runs her hands over her wrists, arms crossed in front of her, and her eyes flick once towards Stan.

“Back when we were thirteen, when I was in the Deadlights, it was like I could see a million futures at once. I told you I’d seen us all grown up, I saw us come back here.” She chews at the inside of her cheek, ducks her head for a moment before looking up, a deep sadness that seems so out of place on her face. “But it’s not all I saw. I saw us fighting It, sometimes all of us together, othertimes only some of us. Some of the times we tried to leave, or we didn’t come back, and we died anyway. Painfully. But of all the futures I saw in the Deadlights, when I was thirteen, I never-” She shakes her head, hair falling into her eyes like a curtain. “I never saw this one, with all of us but without Richie. Then outside the restaurant, this image flashed into my head, of Richie, of the Deadlights.”

There’s a heavy silence when she finishes speaking. Eddie feels like his head is going to explode, a headache building behind his eyes.

“But,” Stan is the first to speak, hesitant. “Not everything you saw happened, right? If you saw futures where we didn’t come here, well, they never happened because we _are_ here. How can you tell which futures are true?”

Bev shakes her head. “I can’t. All I do know is, us together, fighting It, is the best chance we have, because if we leave, we die.”

Despite the warm yellow of the lights in the lounge, Eddie feels a shiver run up his spine at her words. But he also realises, that while the impulse to run still hasn’t really left him, the idea of leaving never really occurred to him. His legs want to carry him somewhere, that’s true enough, but despite the horror of this town his internal compass doesn’t point out of Derry.

“What about Richie, though?” Eddie says. “If he _is_ down there, shouldn’t we be- shouldn’t we go help him?” He looks around at the others, looks at Bill, wanting him to jump in, like he did when they were younger, when Bill lead them near-fearlessly to face their fears. Bill just looks back at him, tired eyes, a little lost. Eddie keeps talking, implores. “Like when Bev was taken, when we went to save her. We should be doing that, we should go, now-”

“No.” Mike interrupts, and Eddie swings his head around to stare at him, open-mouthed.

“What the fuck do you mean _no_?” he snaps, incredulous and a little furious.

Mike doesn’t blink an eye at his tone. “Last time we didn’t really defeat Pennywise, because we didn’t know how. This time, we can. We can defeat It for good. But to do that, we need a different sort of weapon.”

“Well, what weapon, then? Let’s go get it.” Eddie stands up, looks at him expectantly.

Mike just shakes his head.

“Tomorrow. We should all get some sleep, we need to be alert for this to work.”

“But if Richie’s down there-”

“We don’t know that for sure,” Mike cuts him off, looking around the room at each one of them before settling his gaze on Bill. “What we do know is that we’re only going to get one chance to do this, so we have to do it right, give _all_ of us the best chance.”

A long moment passes where Mike stares intently at Bill, where they all watch and wait, and it feels just like it did when they were kids, waiting on their leader to decide what they should do.

Finally, Bill nods. “Tomorrow.”

Eddie wants to keep arguing, tense with this unnamable drive under his skin, in his bones, but the others are nodding in agreement, so he swallows down his restless energy and follows suit.

He has to take a couple of sleeping pills, certain he won’t be able to sleep without them, and his mind is so addled by everything the past 24 hours have brought that they don’t kick in until the clock on the bedside table has ticked over to early morning.


	2. Chapter 2

Walking through Derry in the bright light of day is almost like walking through a dream. Every street, every house, every tree is familiar and oversaturated in colour, overlaid with sense memories, and Eddie thinks he could so easily let his feet carry him back down paths he trod as a kid, every step bringing back more that he’s buried, forgotten.

As they follow Mike down towards the Kenduskeag, as Eddie takes off his shoes and neatly rolls up the legs of his pants to wade across, cool water and rocks under his feet, the familiarity turns into something stronger. The lack of buildings as a point of reference for scale makes him feel both smaller and bigger than his body, the memory of a time when he didn’t feel trapped by his frame, when the world was large but with his friends around he was larger.

Climbing down the ladder steps into the clubhouse brings back the reality of just how much time has passed.

“It all seems so much smaller.” Bev says, looking around, one hand trailing over an upright beam.

There’s so much dust across every surface, spiderwebs reaching across corners and under the few pieces of furniture they had brought down here. It strangely doesn’t bother Eddie that much, maybe because he knows how often he was down here as a kid, happily underground amid the dirt, how this was always one of their safe places. Even though he can remember being fairly vigilant about using and passing around hand sanitiser, he also remembers forgoing the shower caps that Stan passed around, him and Richie the only two who did, crowded into the hammock together, uncaring of the threat of spiders in their hair.

Now, the hammock ropes have long since disintegrated, the canvas slumped on the ground and half buried under loose earth.

Eddie can’t quite help the way his mouth pulls up in a smile at the memory comes to the surface, looking at what’s left of the hammock. The utter frustration he had felt that had driven him into the hammock, feet kicking and pushing against Richie to make space for himself, pointless arguing over time limits and turn-taking that he knew full well Richie would never comply with. He remembers squirming and squabbling –

_“-been in there for 23 minutes, asshole-”_

-and kicking his shoes off, finally settling down when Richie planted a hand on his shin and held him still. And even then it didn’t keep him still for long.

Looking back he can’t really remember a moment when he didn’t feel like there was a current of energy running under his skin. Kept in check at home to appease his mother, barely contained at school if only for fear of trouble from his teachers or bullies, and finally being allowed to let it run free with his friends. And no matter how much energy he tried to use up during those few free hours, it was like there was always more below the surface, a never-ending well that couldn’t be depleted.

With the Losers, though, it wasn’t such a bad thing. It didn’t matter if he spoke too quickly or too much, nervous energy keeping him moving, because they were all right there with him.

Sitting in the hammock with Richie was one of the few things that somehow managed to calm him down, no matter the scuffle that came before it. Once they were both in, heads at opposite ends and legs tangled in the middle, he felt… settled. There was something comforting about being wrapped up, suspended and safe, and no matter how much they complained at each other, Richie never flipped him out, and neither did Eddie.

Like it was just _meant_ to be that way, the two of them.

“So,” Bill asks, and Eddie jolts out of his reverie, looks up. “W-what are we d-d-doing here, Mike?”

One by one they head up out of the clubhouse again as Mike explains what they need to do, retracing their steps when they were apart that summer, that they’ll know the token they need when they see it. Tells them that they need to remember, that it’s the memories that will give the artefacts their power, the same power that they used to come together and –temporarily- defeat It last time.

It all seems fairly straightforward, if a little lacking in instruction.

And they have to remember alone.

Eddie’s less than thrilled at splitting up, but at least he figures he’ll be quick. It’s not like he was allowed out many places with his broken arm, practically under house arrest with his mother until he could convince her that he was alright to walk down to the pharmacy on his own, so he knows that will be his destination. He can refill his inhaler prescription while he’s there, kill two birds with one stone.

“What about Richie?” Stan asks, just before they turn to leave. “If we need a token from all of us…”

Mike hesitates, unsurety crossing his features, but Eddie suddenly remembers something, a chance memory flitting across his brain.

“Wait a minute…” he mutters, and then ducks back down the ladder into the clubhouse, over to where the canvas of the hammock is piled up. He shifts it aside, reaches between one of the slatted pallets that doubled as floorboards, ignores the cobwebs and grime, searching for-

“Got it.”

He emerges back up the ladder to the others’ curious faces, rolled up comic book held aloft in one hand, aged and ripped with several dog-eared pages. “He hid it here, that summer.” He explains, “We’d talked about getting the new issue, splitting the cost, but then when everything happened- and afterwards I remember when he showed me, he told me he went and bought it himself anyway and he was going to lend it to me, except my mom would have found out if I kept it at home so-” he cuts himself off at the amused expressions the others have trained on him, the same fond amusement when he’d ramble too much as a kid, even if they’d never tell him to stop.

Eddie clears his throat and holds the comic out to Mike. “I figure, close enough?”

Mike smiles back at him, nods. “It’ll work.”

/ / /

Barely an hour later, Eddie speedwalks away from the pharmacy, back across Derry’s centre to the townhouse, arms held stiffly at his sides as he tries not to open his mouth or blink too much, lest anymore of the god-awful bile drips in. He’s positive he can feel some of it at the back of his throat anyway, barely manages a tense “I’m fine, everything’s fine” as he pushes past Bev and Ben at the bottom of the stairs.

In his room he goes straight for the bathroom, already ducking his head down level with the sink, first to spit and then to scrub frantically at his face with water. He’ll need to take at least a ten-minute shower, probably burn these clothes, swill a gallon of mouthwash-

“ _It’s your time, Eddie_.”

Getting stabbed is awful.

Behind the shocked pain, he vaguely considers that he’s never felt something so off-putting as having metal between his teeth while _not_ in a dentist’s office. He supposes he can sort of be thankful for already going through the whole leper encounter, because at this point he’s almost past panicking, uncomfortably hysterical laughter escaping him as he slowly pulls the shower curtain between himself and Bowers, as if the thin sheet of plastic would be enough to protect him. It almost seems like it could though, as both his and Bowers laughter peters out. Out of sight, out of mind, and Bowers is _definitely_ out of his.

Eddie wonders if you can overdose on your own adrenaline, because as he pulls the knife out of his cheek, feels the sick squelch of flesh and blood, as he turns the sharp blade towards the shower curtain and stabs, feels it connect and sink in, and as he slowly inches his way out of the bathroom with his back to the wall, his heart is beating so fast he wonders if it will just give out.

“Cut that fucking mullet, it’s been like 30 years man.”

Ben offers his bathroom for Eddie to clean up in, and both he and Bev stay in the adjoining room while Eddie speeds through a cursory shower, changes his clothes and tapes his cheek up as best he can with what he’s got. It’s probably the most rushed clean up job he’s ever done, but it’s for the best anyway, because by the time Ben’s driven them over to the library to meet up with the others and warn them about Bowers on the loose, they’re just in time to walk in and see Stan bury a hatchet in Bowers’ skull.

Stan staggers back a few steps, panting and shaking, and Mike rolls to his feet beside him, bleeding arm held up protectively to his chest.

“Thanks.” Mike breathes out, looking a little shell-shocked. Stan just nods back, so pale that the teeth-puncture scars around his face stand out stark.

Eddie has to swallow down that hysterical laughter as it bubbles up inside him again when he meets Stan’s eye. For some reason he thinks it’s just a little ridiculous how the two of them, arguably with the most mundane and straight-laced jobs, a risk analyst and an accountant, are now the two that share their old childhood bully’s blood on their hands.

\ \ \

Things only seem to get worse.

After the phone call with Bill it’s another mad dash from the library to Neibolt Street, and despite how raring to go he was last night, when they reach the front of the house it feels too soon. Maybe it’s because, just like last time they did this, they’ve had to rush here to stop Bill going on his own, not enough time to truly prepare, armed with nothing more than flashlights and childhood memories.

And maybe this is part of it too, the cyclical nature of everything to do with It, reliving that summer of horror, gathering at Neibolt, following Bill through it all, down into the heart of evil to kill the monster. Maybe things have to happen this way, the same pattern of events, the same levels they have to play to win the game.

But Richie was always the best out of all of them at the arcade, and he’s not here to help them now.

_Guess Richie can’t come and play..._

Eddie suppresses a shudder as the fortune cookie message drifts across his mind, unbidden. There’s a small guilty part of him that almost hopes they do find him down there, waiting for them, ready to fight, if only because it means their group will be complete, but mostly he hopes that Richie never came, that he’s far away, because he wouldn’t wish this situation on anyone.

He wishes they didn’t have to do this, the six of them, but he knows they have to.

Standing on the porch before they go in, captain at the helm, Bill quirks a small, determined smile. “Richie said it b-b-best, when we were here last.”

There’s a brief pause, but Eddie hardly has to work to think back to that summer anymore, the memory of walking into this house for the first time flooding his mind easily, and the words spring to his mouth.

“‘We’re lucky we’re not measuring dicks’?” he quotes at the same time as Ben says, “‘I don’t want to die’?”

They look at each other, and Bill’s shaking his head, still smiling wryly, but then Stan looks up from his feet, steely and determined.

“Let’s kill this fucking clown.”

/ / /

The door slams shut between them just as Ben starts screaming, and Eddie and Bill throw themselves at it with a shout, but no matter how much they jiggle the handle or push or kick at the wood, it won’t open. Ben’s shouts turn blood curdling, and Eddie wonders how things have gone to shit so quickly.

Then, the old refrigerator starts rattling, shaking on the floor, and as something starts banging, knocking on it from the inside, Eddie feels a flash of déjà vu go through him, a phantom ache in his arm.

The fridge door creaks open.

Once again, a twisted body is crammed inside, but this time it’s not the clown, it’s smaller, a child’s proportions, recognisable even under the filth, jeans and T-shirt and a faded Hawaiian shirt.

A familiar face looks up with the sound of cracking vertebrae and popping ligaments, greyed out skin with cuts and what looks like puncture wounds around his lips. There are remnants of black thread still hanging from some of them, as if his mouth had once been sewn shut.

Eddie stares at the rotting face of his childhood best friend and feels what little courage he had left in him fade into nothing.

Richie screams, high and jarring, and his head pops right off and out, rolling across the kitchen as Stan jumps back out of the way.

Richie’s head comes to a rest, dropping onto the severed neck with a wet sound, and somehow his glasses are still on his face, plastic arms shoved into his matted hair. He looks up with wide milky eyes, magnified behind cracked lenses, staring up through the light of Bill’s torch.

“I told you, Bill, I told you I didn’t want to die.” His voice is soft, watery and high as he speaks, the same words and inflection from the sewers when they fought It the first time, all those years ago. “It’s your fault.”

Bill shakes his head seemingly unconsciously, but doesn’t look away.

The skin on Richie’s cheeks moves and bulges as his gaze turn to Stan, pleading, pain laced through his words. “Stan, what’s happening to me?”

Stan doesn’t say anything, doesn’t move, eyes locked on Richie, who’s started wincing and whimpering in pain. Something begins to tear through the skin on either side of Richie’s face, pushing his glasses askew, tangling in his hair.

Richie’s eyes slide over to Eddie, still pressed against the door as flat as he can make himself, and Eddie thinks he’s never seen such raw pain on Richie’s face.

“Eddie…”

He feels like he’s going to throw up.

The things growing out of his skin –they’re legs, segmented insect legs- flail and scrabble to touch the floor, begin to lift Richie’s head up until it’s dangling in the middle like a grotesque imitation of a spider. His whimpers give way to laughter, loud and staccato, until it abruptly stops, and Richie grins wide.

“Look at me, Eddie. _Look. At. Me_.”

All three of them jump and shout when Spider-Richie suddenly runs forward, leaping at them with too many sharp teeth, biting and frothing and laughing and snarling in the light of their waving flashlight beams. Eddie backs away as fast as he can, his elbows knocking into the cabinets and his back hitting the wall, and then Spider-Richie is up in the rafters and leaping down onto Stan, legs clamping around him like an Alien face-hugger. Stan yells, grabbing at it, and the momentum puts him on his back on the floor. Bill rushes over to him, hands trying to find purchase to pull it off Stan, but it’s so strong the both of them struggle just to hold it back.

“The kn-kn-knife! Goddamnit Eddie, _get the knife!_ ”

Bill’s yelling but Stan has stopped, mouth firmly closed to try and avoid the steady stream of drool leaking from Spider-Richie’s mouth and snapping teeth, and Eddie knows he should be doing something, _anything_ , but he can’t, he feels frozen, terrified, and he can’t kill it, he _can’t_ because-

 _Because_ -

It’s _Richie_.

A blurry movement and a loud war-cry and suddenly Ben’s there with a rusty old kitchen knife, stabbing it down once, twice, repeatedly, sickeningly slick sounds as he drives the blade into Spider-Richie’s head, until finally he kicks it, punts it off towards the doorway where it staggers and chokes out a laughs and drags itself into the darkness beyond, the last glint of glasses and huge magnified eyes-

Bill grabs him by the front of his shirt and hauls him rough against the wall.

“He could have f-f-fucking _died_ , man, you know that right?!” He shouts, loud and vicious, angry in the way Bill so often was that summer. He shakes Eddie a bit and even though Bill’s shorter than him now, Eddie feels so small in this moment. “W-what the _fuck_? Did you w-w- _want_ Stan to die, d-did you want that?!”

“No-” he gasps, and his voice comes out as small as he feels, shaking around the words. “Please don’t be mad, Bill. I was just-” Frozen, terrified at the shock of seeing Richie’s face, young and decaying and twisted so cruelly. At the way he’d said Eddie’s name, how he’d said the same words he’d said when they were thirteen and more scared than they’d ever been, crouched in this same kitchen as evil incarnate stalked towards them. Telling Eddie not to look at the monster, hands on his face, to look at _him_ instead. “-scared.”

Between a few more breaths where Bill’s eyes flick between each of Eddie’s, the tension goes out of him and his grip loosens.

“Yeah.” He says, sounding so tired. “That’s w-w-what It w-wants. Don’t give it to him.”

\ \ \

They climb down the well, and it’s both easier than it was last time, with no cumbersome cast and a full range of movement, further reach with adult arms, and harder with the foreknowledge of what they’re climbing down to.

Even though they only came down here once before, Eddie feels like he knows the path, like deep in his conscious there’s a twisted sort of compass that points down, guides each turn of pipe. That pull simultaneously wars with another part of him that wants to leave, climb up and drive away and just _leave_ , despite Bev’s warning that he’d die if he did.

He doesn’t think he can do this.

The absence of the tower of junk makes the cistern seem both bigger and smaller than it used to. Without anything to block the middle, there’s no wondering what could be hiding around a corner, but the way the empty space stretches up and up, eerie watery light reflecting off the smooth prison-like walls…

There are no floating children, no floating bodies at all, and Eddie lets out a small breath, because the closer they’d gotten the more he was sure they’d find Richie floating here like Bev once was, like she said she’d seen. It’s a quiet confirmation that the Spider-Richie was just It’s way of torturing them, that Richie didn’t get Mike’s message, that he never came to Derry, that he’s still out there in the world somewhere, safe.

That brief relief vanishes quickly, when Bev is abruptly pulled under on her way to the concrete island in the centre, and Eddie can’t bring himself to move, frozen _again_ , even as his mind screams at him to help, in a voice that sounds like Bill’s.

He can’t do this.

Bev resurfaces, they all scramble up onto the rock, and the dread that’s been sitting like lead in his stomach since they walked into the house feels like it doubles when Mike unscrews the hatch and tells them they have to keep going down, further, deeper into the earth.

He _really can’t do this_.

Mike climbs down first, then Bill, and then as Ben moves over to the hatch and Stan steps up beside him, resolute despite how pale he looks, Eddie breaks.

“ _Fuck_ , I can’t do this.”

Bev and Stan turn to look at him, surprised, and he can’t meet their eyes so instead he starts to pace, repeating the words over and over under his breath. It’s only a handful of steps from one side of the rock to the other, and he thinks if the cistern wasn’t partially flooded and there wasn’t the threat of something under the water, there might be nothing to stop him just running out of here, running and running as far and as fast as he can, away from that compass pull inside him, away from all this horror, because he can’t do this, he’s not strong enough, not brave enough, he’s _not enough-_

Stan steps into his path, cutting off his pacing, one hand held up. “Eddie, come on-”

Eddie cuts him off, shaking his head violently. “I can’t do it. I _can’t_. You saw what happened up there, Stan, I was going to let you die. I just fucking froze up, when I saw-” He swallows down the end of that sentence, feeling his throat close up, and the auto-familiarity of his hands fumbling for his inhaler. “If you let me go down there with you,” He bites down on the end of the pump and takes a hit, but it doesn’t really do anything to calm his breathing, the medicinal taste is so strong it actually makes him cough, spluttering the end of his words “I’m going to get us all killed.”

Stan stares at him for a long moment, furrowed brow, and he looks like he’s struggling with something before his shoulders drop and he says matter-of-factly, “I almost killed myself rather than come back here.”

The silence that follows is so thick for a moment Eddie feels again like he can’t breathe, but it’s not the sort of airlessness that he can fix with his inhaler.

Stan takes a small breath, then continues:

“After Mike called, I remembered… everything. All at once. It’s why I went back to the library to meet up with Mike so early, I didn’t need any time to remember what I did those weeks we were apart, and I knew what my token would be as soon as he told us we’d need one.” His jaw clenches, but he keeps eye contact with Eddie, continues in a soft voice. “Sitting in my living room, it was like I lived that summer all over again, every minute of it, and I knew that coming back would mean living it again, fighting _It_ again, and I couldn’t… I got as far as running the bath before I realised what I was doing. I’m still not sure why I snapped out of it, what it was that stopped me, but-” He takes a step forward, and puts his hand on Eddie’s shoulder. “If I can come back here after that, if the biggest coward of the group can go down there, so can you. You’ve always been brave, Eddie.”

Slowly, the urge to run recedes. The enormity of what Stan’s told him is almost overwhelming. An intrusive thought of what this whole journey could have been like, without Stan, spills across his mind even as he recoils from it. He thinks of how they’re already suffering for losing one of their number, and if they’d lost Stan as well he might already have driven out of Derry, almost as soon as he arrived last night, come what may. And he thinks Stan telling him what he almost did, _doing_ what he did, pulling back from the brink only to come face another one, is braver than anything Eddie Kaspbrak could ever hope to achieve.

There’s no hope of putting all that into words, so Eddie just looks back, hopes a little of what he’s thinking comes across on his face and in his voice, and says, “Thanks, Stan.”

Stan nods, pats his shoulder, and then goes straight to the ladder to start climbing down, no hesitation. Ben follows him, and Bev steps up next to Eddie, holds out the ornamental fence post she’s been carrying since they stepped inside Neibolt.

“This kills monsters.” She tells him, a reassuring, encouraging yet grim smile on her face, and Eddie wonders all over again at how courageous all of his friends are. “If you believe it does.”


	3. Chapter 3

There’s a vicious ringing in his ears, gravel and dirt sticking to his clothes and hair from being thrown across the cavern after the giant balloon burst, and the others are scattered around the borders, ducking away from the reaching claw-like arms that sprout from It’s body. He watches Ben and Bev duck through a narrow cave opening across the cavern, sees Stan helping Mike dart between jagged rocks, but he can’t see Bill, squinting against the blinding strobe lights.

He’s hesitated too long, he realises as his eyes flick back to the clown just in time to see It already staring him down. There’s a minuscule pause as he accidentally meets It’s eyes, before it charges with a snarl and Eddie spins on his heel and books it down the cave tunnel behind him.

There’s a snapping tentacle-like arm following him, crashing into the rock walls barely a couple of yards behind, and Eddie makes his feet move faster, somehow doesn’t slip on the loose ground as he darts around the bends and twists of the passageway.

He hurtles around a near-hairpin turn and abruptly skids to a stop.

There are three doors in front of him, set into the rock.

A grating sound makes him whip around, and he sees the thing chasing him pull up short, straining but unable to come closer, like there’s a limit to its reach despite It’s shapeshifting.

Still, it’s blocking the way back, flower-like maw opening and closing, and even if it can’t get closer –for now- it is far too close for comfort, so Eddie turns back to the doors.

_Scary._

_Very Scary._

_Not Scary At All_.

He chokes out a half-laugh. It’s too much of an obvious choice that he knows it must be a trick, but there’s always the slightest chance that It is betting on him suspecting that, betting on him choosing the exact opposite, when the labels are actually accurate. A double bluff, or maybe even a triple bluff, or maybe there’s just no rhyme or reason, no way to accurately choose the door with the least risk on the first go.

Dancing back and forth on each foot for a moment, he opts to go right down the middle and jumps for the _Scary_ door, tightens his grip on the fence spike and twists the knob, flinging it wide open all at once, like ripping off a bandaid.

It’s just a closet.

There’s the shape of some rain jackets hanging up, pairs of rubber boots neatly pushed to each side, and a light string hanging from the ceiling with a pull loop on the end. He reaches for it, hears the click of the switch as a dull yellow light comes on, and notices a puddle of water in the middle of the floor, tinged slightly red.

“ _Where’s my shoe?_ ”

The whisper startles him, makes him take a half-step back, and then he’s hastily grabbing for the edge of the door as with a cheery little _tappity-tap_ sound the lower torso of a little girl - _Betty Ripsom,_ his mind supplies _-_ skips out of the dark towards him, blood and gore dripping from her waist, all the way down to her feet, one shoe on, one shoe gone.

He slams the door shut with a shout, backs away from it and then has to move forward again when the tentacle behind him flails against the rock walls, re-doubling its efforts to get to him.

Without taking another second to think about it, he pulls open the _Not Scary At All_ door.

The sight of his New York living room on the other side makes him screech to a mental halt. He has to blink a few times, taking in the mix of modern, clean, and floral décor that Myra had picked out when they first moved in, everything neat and tidy and familiar. If it weren’t for the feeling of his sewer-waterlogged clothes and the still persistent smell of rock and garbage drowning out the evergreen scented candles, he’d think he was back there, that he’d just woken up from a nightmare.

Although it doesn’t exactly soothe him, looking at the couch with its protective dust cover, at the tv guides and bits of frou-frou; it all makes him want to recoil just as much as the sewers do, but for different reasons.

“ _Eddie-bear?_ ”

He swings his head around to look at the doorway that leads through to the kitchen. Myra’s there, standing with one hand on her hip, looking at him sternly and holding a smoothie glass in her other hand, one of the ones she usually makes him for breakfast before work, filled with blended yoghurt and pea-based protein powder, kale and wheatgerm. That he has to hold his nose to get through, but still drains every day like clockwork.

“ _You haven’t taken your medication this morning_.”

Myra takes a step forward, holding out the glass to him, and as she does some of the flesh on her calves sluices off and falls to the carpet with a wet _splat_.

He lets out a shock-strangled shout, gags, presses a hand to his mouth, and as she takes another step this time a strip peels off her cheek and falls into the smoothie glass, sending a wave of sick-green liquid splashing over the sides, tiny white things moving in it. It takes him another second to realise that they’re _maggots_ , and then he slams the door shut.

He has to take a moment, heart racing too fast, gasping for breath and willing himself not to throw up.

The tentacle continues to thrash against the rock; the impact causes some of the ceiling to fall, and it gains another few feet of distance. Eddie grits his teeth and chooses his only remaining option. The red letters of _Very Scary_ bleed upwards as he turns the doorknob, peers around the wood carefully.

It’s dark inside.

For a moment he thinks it’s just an empty void, but then he notices the blue strobe lights reflecting off wet dark rock, and realises it’s a continuation of the passageway behind him, the door jamb set into the stone. Judging from the lights flickering around the curve of the tunnel, it looks like it leads back to the main cavern.

Wary after the last two doors, he inches forward carefully, slow and careful steps, but nothing happens as he approaches the bend in the rock.

Beyond he can see the cavern from a different angle, can see a hint of the weird space-rock curving up in the centre, and directly in front of him, a figure crouched behind a rock with wild dark hair and a leather jacket, and even with his back turned Eddie recognises who this is, _knows_ with absolute certainty even as his heart thumps terror against his ribcage.

Eddie barely breathes, steps forward, asks, “Richie?”

The figure whips his head around, wide eyes locking onto Eddie, limbs tense like he’s getting ready to run. And just like all of them he looks different yet the same, the echoes of a childhood face morphed into his adult one, jaw stronger, hairline receded somewhat, but the same eyes, same features, and Bev was right, he did grow into his looks. There’s a moment when they’re both frozen, staring at each other, and then Richie’s jaw drops.

His voice sounds hoarse and strained when he whispers, “Eds?”

“Don’t call me that.” Eddie says, automatic, a little startled at himself, and then _very_ startled when Richie’s eyes fill with tears, even as he lets out a little choked laugh.

“Holy shit. _Eddie_.”

Eddie takes a few cautious steps forward until he’s only a couple of feet away, lets his eyes rake over Richie’s appearance properly, and feels something heavy settle in his stomach because he looks… bad.

Richie looks like he hasn’t slept, possibly eaten, in days, judging by the hollow look to his cheeks and dark rings under his eyes, and his clothes are filthy, torn, hanging off his frame. He’s got a scraggly amount of beard going on, and one of his glasses’ lenses is cracked. Apart from being absolutely covered in dirt and grime, there’s also dried blood on his forehead, on his legs through the torn knees of his jeans, and a particularly dark patch of blood staining the front of his button-up shirt, sticking to his stomach and chest in places.

It hits Eddie that he looks like he’s been here for _weeks_.

Richie holds out a shaking hand, and when he makes contact, touches Eddie’s arm, he lets out a noise that sounds somewhere between a sob and a whine, gripping Eddie’s shoulder. His hand moves up to Eddie’s cheek, shaking, filthy fingers alighting over the bandage there.

“What happened?” He asks, so gently and concerned despite looking like death warmed up himself.

Eddie swallows, still struggling to get over his shock at finding Richie _here_. “Henry Bowers. Was in my room. Stabbed me with a knife.”

Richie looks around at that, high alert. “ _Bowers?_ Is he here?”

“No, he uh, I stabbed him back, and then Stan put a hatchet in his head.”

Richie looks back at Eddie, disbelief and barely concealed hope writ across his face. “Stan? He’s here too?”

“Yeah, we- all of us, we all came back.”

“Losers Club, together again…” Richie mumbles absently, and then suddenly his eyes go wide and frightened and he plants his palm on Eddie’s chest, shoves him back, hard enough that Eddie stumbles over the loose rocky ground, surprised.

“Hey! What the fuck, asshole?”

Richie’s pressed his back against the rock behind him, shrinking away from Eddie, but still manages a reasonably threatening expression. He points a trembling finger at him, glowering. “ _No_. No way am I falling for this again. I know your moves, you little bitch.”

Eddie stares at him, confused out of his mind at the abrupt change. “Richie, what-?”

“Shut up!” Richie screams at him, voice cracking. “You’re not real! I know you’re not fucking real, you’re not getting me like that! You’re _not him!_ ”

He breaks off, panting, still pointing at Eddie, though now his whole arm is shaking, and after a minute he puts it down, grasping onto the rock with both hands like it’s the only thing keeping him upright.

Eddie’s not sure what to do. He’d had the half-thought that maybe this Richie wasn’t real, that this whole scenario since he’d stepped through the door was just another illusion of It’s, but he doesn’t think an illusion would be accusing _him_ of not being real. He’s not sure how to convince Richie of that, though, considering it sounds like he’s maybe encountered this situation before.

He doesn’t get a chance to think of something, however, because the next second they hear a cut-off shout, and Eddie turns towards it with a jolt of fear because it sounds like Mike. There’s a follow up deep, echoing chuckle from Pennywise. Eddie spares another glance at Richie, who’s looking back at him, spooked and wary, and he really should do something, say something to get him to realise he’s real. But there’s no more time.

“That’s Mike, come on!” Eddie says, and doesn’t wait to see if Richie follows, just darts around the crag of rock out onto a little ledge overlooking the main cavern.

Pennywise has Mike wrapped up in one of his tentacle-arms, spiked claw pointed straight at his throat, and Eddie pulls up short. The ledge is on is too high to jump off, and Mike’s too far for him to get to if he wastes time trying to find a way down, he’ll be too late-

Richie goes speeding past him, bending to pick up a fist-sized chunk of rock and lobbing it straight at Pennywise, nailing It right in the side of the head just as it starts opening its mouth. It swings around to stare up at the shelf where they’re standing.

“Hey fuckface!” Richie shouts, arms windmilling to find his balance as he stands on the edge of the shelf. Pennywise tosses Mike aside to turn more fully towards him, grinning viciously.

“Oh- _ho_ is it time to play again, Richie?” It jeers, tilting its head like a weird imitation of a puppy.

Richie just bends down to grab another rock, sneering back at It. “You wanna play, you sloppy bitch? Fine! Let’s fucking dance! _Yippie-ki-yay, motherf-!_ ”

There’s a flash of light, so blindingly white Eddie has to blink spots away from his vision, and when he does he sees Richie, limbs dangling loosely and head tipped back, mouth open as he stares up into It’s mouth. Then he starts to float, and Eddie realises Richie’s been caught up in the Deadlights, shining through the back of Pennywise’s head and out through It’s multiple layers of teeth, tinged orange like a spotlight.

“No…” Eddie mumbles in quiet horror, staring up at Bev’s vision come to life.

Richie already looks like a corpse, like one of the floating missing children around the tower of garbage in Pennywise’s upper lair, and Eddie thinks how somehow he’d been surviving here, _alone_ , for who knows how longe, and as soon as the rest of them showed up, as soon as _Eddie_ showed up he got caught. And now Richie’s going to be eaten, drifting higher, closer and closer to It’s maw, and there’s just one word beating against the inside of Eddie’s skull.

 _No_.

He’s gripping the metal spike in his hand so tightly it feels like it’s biting into his palm, and he only spares himself another brief moment to steel himself, repeat Bev’s words under his breath, believe it with every atom of his self, “This kills monsters.”

Eddie throws off his headlight, plants his feet hard against the rock to push off and sprint the few feet distance to the edge, swings his arm back and launches the spike forward with a yell.

“BEEP BEEP MOTHERFUCKER!”

The spike soars dead centre into It’s mouth, lodges in its head and sends it reeling back with a choked roar.

In the same instant the orange beam of light goes out, and Richie’s body drops heavily down to the rock floor with a thump. Eddie doesn’t hesitate; a quick search finds a step of rocks down one side of the cavern wall beside the ledge, and he swings himself down until he’s reached level ground and sprints around to where Richie landed.

He stumbles once when he hears a strange crash and gurgle, looks over his shoulder to see It impaled on one of the space rock spikes in the center, spitting fire from It’s mouth as it writhes.

“Rich, hey, Richie!

He reaches Richie, crouches down beside him and puts a hand on his shoulder. Richie’s eyelids are half-closed, eyes rolled back and mouth still open a little. He doesn’t stir at all when Eddie shakes him, and Eddie looks over his shoulder again at the clown, then to where Mike is sitting himself up off the ground, and beckons.

“Hey! Help me!”

Mike pushes to his feet, and Bill comes out from behind a rock near him, where he’d been hidden from Eddie’s view before. They both stumble over to him, and Eddie quickly gets his hands underneath Richie’s arms, propping him up. Bill and Mike get the idea, grab a leg each, and they lift Richie’s body up, stagger over to a gap in the cave wall when Eddie nods his head towards it. They’re almost there when Eddie glances up, just to see Pennywise raising its head upright, yellow eyes staring straight at them, and one arm arch up into the air, claw spike glinting in the flashing light.

“Oh fuck.” Eddie gasps, and then shouts, “Move!” just as the spike comes shooting towards them.

Mike and Bill turn to look briefly before jumping away to either side, pulling in different directions and incidentally both managing to let Richie’s legs slip from their grasps. Eddie hauls Richie backwards as quickly as he can, but with the sudden added weight now that Eddie’s the only one holding him up he stumbles, trying desperately to keep his footing.

It’s claw twitches, seems to shift a little larger and sharper, and then speeds towards him like a mimic of the fence post.

Eddie’s left foot comes down on nothing but air, and he falls, tight grip dragging Richie with him as he tumbles down the rocky incline into the cave behind him.

He hears the sharp _thunk_ as Pennywise’s claw must hit the rock, and feels some loose gravel fall from the ceiling of the cave onto him, the dust making him cough and splutter. He tries to take in a deeper breath, but he’s landed flat on his back with Richie completely on top of him, dead weight, and it’s that thought that urges Eddie to wriggle his way somewhat upright, leaving Richie in his lap, his head leaning back on Eddie’s chest.

A shout of his name makes him look up, as Mike and Bill, and then Stan, Bev and Ben all race into the cave, taking a more careful approach down the slope than he did. Their faces cycling through relief when they spot him, through surprise when they catch sight of Richie, and onto a dawning sort of horror when they notice the state he’s in. Stan in particular appears frozen with his mouth open, and Bev has her hands over her face, her eyes wide in what Eddie realises is a blood-covered face.

“Holy shit.” Stan mutters.

Whatever spell was over them is broken, and they descend on Eddie, help him turn Richie around to prop him up against the rock wall, all of them crowded in close.

If Eddie thought Richie looked bad when he first saw him, he looks even worse now.

His face is so pale it makes the dark hollows around his eyes even more pronounced, and it looks like he bit through his lower lip when he fell, tiny droplets of blood welling up on the chapped skin.

Richie’s eyes are still blank, almost completely closed, and Eddie realises with a spike of horror he can’t actually see his chest move, can’t tell if he’s breathing.

He hastily presses his fingers to Richie’s neck, feels for a pulse, and while he does find it, it’s so arrhythmic and weak that it only goes a little way to comforting him.

Eddie moves on with his inspection, falling into old habits, moves his fingers back to feel around the back of Richie’s head, searching for a bump or head wound, but his hair’s so matted with blood and dirt already that he can’t be sure if any of it’s new.

The dark patch of blood staining the front of his shirt across his stomach looks a little wetter than it did before, so he reaches out to undo the buttons, pushes the shirt aside to note that the blood on his T-shirt is _definitely_ new. Carefully, he grips the hem and pulls it up, and hears his sharp intake of breath echoed by the others.

Carved into Richie’s skin, bleeding sluggishly, are the words _dirty little secret_.

Eddie feels sick, looking at the cuts, noticing the skin around them is red and inflamed, and his own chest aches as he starts to take in more than the words. Richie looks half-starved; the lines of his ribs are showing, chest expanding and contracting shallowly under splotchy bruised skin, and his stomach looks hollow, his belt clearly notched tighter to hold his jeans from slipping down.

“How is he _alive_?” Bev whispers, aghast.

Swallowing around the lump in his throat, Eddie gently pulls Richie’s T-shirt back into place, re-buttons his shirt, and then does up the zip of his leather jacket as well, thinking to keep him warm because he’s so thin he must be feeling the cold and damp in his _bones_.

The distant crashing of Pennywise above echoes around them.

They need to move, to get out of here.

Richie’s eyes are still rolled back and white when Eddie pulls his lids open to check them, patting his cheek lightly, saying “Richie, c’mon man, wake up.”

No reaction.

Bill shuffles on his feet beside them. “W-we could leave him here. He sh-sh-should be safe in here if we d-draw It’s attention away…”

“Or he could be crushed in a cave in.” Stan shoots back. “Whenever we get separated things go wrong. We need to stick together.”

“So we carry him out with us?” Bev asks, looking up at the exit uneasily. Ben follows her gaze and then moves to examine the walls of the cave.

Mike shakes his head. “Someone would still need to stay with him then, and if the goal is to not split up-”

“Well we c-c-can’t just stay in here forever, then w-we’re all gonna die!” Bill snaps.

With his palm still pressed to Richie’s cheek, eyes darting about his face, Eddie has a thought. It’s probably a ridiculously dumb thought, but his usual meter for what could be considered dumb or reckless has been severely altered after everything. He thinks back to when they were thirteen, rushing down into the sewers to get their friend back, pulling Bev down from the air by her ankles, her eyes blank white and staring, mute to their attempts to shake her out of whatever trance the Deadlights put her in. Remembers Ben cupping her cheeks with a gentle determination, and their shocked exclamations when the colour came back to her eyes, like something out of a fairy tale. Like magic.

He doesn’t let himself think about all the time Richie’s been down here, about the dirt and the blood and grey water, and the millions, billions of germs. Instead he thinks about fairy tales, about childhood magic, and _believes_.

Eddie ducks his face in close, fingers spread across a bearded jaw, and presses a swift, hard kiss to Richie’s slack mouth.

Everyone goes silent.

He holds it for a beat, and when he pulls back, Richie suddenly gasps in a deep breath. His eyelids open a fraction, blink wider, and the white film pulls back to show his clear eyes beneath. Richie looks at Eddie, and the tiniest hint of recognition flickers there, slowly grows.

“Eddie?” he croaks.

“Hey,” Eddie smiles softly, then clears his throat. “Welcome back, buddy.” He lets his hands drop, letting them fall to rest on Richie’s knees.

Richie blinks, frowns a little. “Back..?” He winces at the way voice cracks, licks his lips and swallows dryly, and then pushes himself up against the rock a little, freezing when his eyes focus past Eddie on the others.

“Oh.” He says. “Hi guys.”

Eddie moves back a bit to give the others some space to greet Richie, though he notes that none of them hug him too tightly, knows they’re thinking about the wounds on his stomach. A pang goes through his chest at the reminder.

“Damn, you all look amazing.” Richie’s saying, grinning up at Bev and then Ben as they carefully embrace him. “Apart from the blood, ‘a course, but seriously, what sorta supermodel juice are you lot drinking? And what the fuck happened to me?”

There’s something almost- too casual, about the way Richie’s talking to them, how after the initial pause he seems almost as if he’d expected to see them. When Mike pulls back from his own greeting hug and claps a gentle hand on Richie’s shoulder, Richie chuckles and says, “Ha, hey Mike, remember the last time we did this?”

Mike frowns, hesitantly replies. “No?” but Richie doesn’t even seem phased, his gaze a little loose and unfocused.

“Sure ya do, homeschool, the party just keeps going!”

Bev catches Eddie’s eye, and he sees the same worry reflected back at him. Stan’s the last to step forward, kneeling down with a small smile.

“It’s good to see you, Rich.”

Finally, Richie goes quiet, staring, and when he speaks this time, it’s a little hesitant. “Staniel, is that you? I’ve-” he pauses, and sweeps his gaze around at all of them before landing back on Stan. “I’ve never seen you grown up before.”

He breaks off, swallows again, and this time takes a little longer looking at each of them, takes in the cave they’re in. His hand twitches towards his stomach, and when his fingers touch the leather he blinks down at his zipped up jacket, realisation creeping over his face.

He looks to Eddie for confirmation as he says, “You’re all really here.”

Eddie just nods.

Bev crouches down on his other side again, reaches out to gently touch Richie’s arm. “How long have you been here, Richie?”

Richie squints, thinks. “I, uh, I’m not sure… I think I got to Derry on the 3rd?”

A shiver of dismay goes around the group. _Weeks_. He’s been down here for _weeks_.

Richie’s expression grows concerned. “Why? What’s the date today?”

When no one else answers, Stan clears his throat and tells him quietly. “It’s the 27th.”

After a second of shock a sort of resignation comes over Richie’s face. He looks down at his hands in his lap, seems to take notice of just how filthy and bloodied they are, flexing his fingers.

Eddie blurts out what Bev had asked earlier. “How are you even still _alive_? How-? Why hasn’t It killed you yet?”

Stan elbows him for his bluntness, but Richie just laughs, a little hollow.

“I think It wanted me alive, to entertain itself with, to lure you all down here.” He looks up at them, a brief flash of regret that Eddie wants to address, before he continues. “When it got bored of me trying to fight, It’d hit me with the Deadlights. I’m not really sure how I haven’t kicked the bucket already. I didn’t know it had been that long. Kinda stopped getting hungry, and when I get too thirsty I just drink some of the water that drips down the walls-”

“You _what?_ ” Eddie screeches, aghast. “There are probably so many diseases in that! We are _literally inside a sewer!_ ”

Richie shrugs. “Yeah, but, y’know. Thirsty. And I kinda figured I was gonna die eventually anyway. I think I lost some time in the Deadlights, thought I _was_ dead the first couple of times I got caught in them, but then I’d wake up again later, somewhere different in the cavern, still kicking.”

He frowns. “Speaking of, how did you manage to get me out of them so quickly this time?”

Eddie involuntarily feels heat creep up his cheeks, but he’s saved from answering when a particularly loud crash echoes above them. A few smaller rocks tumble down into their cave, and Pennywise’s voice calls to them, loud and cajoling.

“ _Looooooseeeeers_ , come out to _plaaaay_! Do you want to know a _secret_?”

Richie flinches, almost imperceptibly, and rubs absentmindedly at his stomach.

“We could have so much _fun_ together, oh! All together again, so much _delicious feeaaar!_ ”

Bill’s staring up at the entrance to the cave, and he turns to look at them, the familiar mantle of leader settling over him, showing in the hard look in his eyes. “W-we’ve beaten it b-before, we can d-do it again. We n-need a way to k-kill It.” The cave shakes again. “Quickly.”

Eddie thinks, wracks his brain, though he doesn’t know what could possibly work. They’ve already tried so many things; literally beating It up only worked temporarily when they were children, Mike’s ritual didn’t work, impaling It didn’t work, every time It only came back stronger, bigger-

Except.

A thought occurs.

“The leper…”

\ \ \

“You’re just a clown!”

Screaming abuse to shrink down an alien fear-eating shape-shifting monster is not the sort of thing that Eddie thought they would be doing. Somehow the fact that it doesn’t rely on them being the best fighters, or magic-workers, just on them throwing insults like they would as kids, makes him feel even stronger, makes him realise that they _can_ do this. They can kill this fucking clown.

“Ugly fucking painting!”

“Walking infection!”

Hearing all of the others’ voices, too, yelling until they start to go hoarse and then yelling some more, watching Pennywise shrink and shrivel in on Itself, until all that’s left is barely the size of a baby, something resembling a deflated fungus, and Mike is reaching into It’s body and pulling out a wrinkled pulsing heart.

Seven hands clasp together, and squeeze.

It crumbles into dust.

The cavern starts to shake, rock and debris falling and collapsing, and despite their exhaustion they run, climb, wade through rising water and scramble up the well. Eddie feels like he’s been running for so long since they’ve been down here, yet somehow there’s still that energy, that drive under his skin, in his bones, giving him enough strength to navigate back up through the pipes, that internal compass guiding him up.

He and Stan help Richie through some of the harder parts, when his limbs start to tremble, and finally they all burst through the front door of the house, stumble out onto the street, and watch it all come crashing down.

For a long moment they all stand there, panting in the sun, and then Richie’s legs finally give out under him. Since he’s still got one arm around him Eddie goes down too, both of them sinking to their knees on the ground.

Richie’s staring up at the sky, blinking as his eyes adjust. He looks more ghostly in the daylight than he did in the sewers, and Eddie pats his shoulder carefully, watches twin trails of silent tears streak down his cheeks, cutting tracks through the dirt on his face. His lips are moving, and when Eddie ducks a little closer he can make out the words whispered under his breath.

“Be real. Please be real. Don’t let me wake up.” 


	4. Chapter 4

At Bill’s suggestion, they walk to the quarry. Eddie thinks that just maybe they should think about going to a hospital, or at least somewhere where they can actually clean themselves up, not just swim about in questionable water. But it seems almost a predestined conclusion, a way to finish off their trip -nightmare- down memory lane, the last checkbox on the list.

Once again, Bev beats them all to it, slips her shoes off and leaps fearlessly far out over the cliff, down to the water below. They all start to follow, one at a time, and though Eddie does make an effort to talk Richie out of following suit, considering how he’s swaying on his feet just from the effort of standing, Richie just gives him a look and holds out a dirt-encrusted hand.

“C’mon, Eds, we’re never coming back here ever again. At least this is a good memory to relive.”

Coupled with the others’ voices drifting up to them from below, encouraging them, he has to give in. He goes to Richie’s side, and they jump together, their hands clasped tightly all the way down until the impact of hitting the water separates them.

Eddie surfaces just as Stan hits one hand against the water, sending a splash-wave past him towards Bill. He reaches out automatically for Richie’s hand again when he breaks the surface, guiding him over to the rocks that sit shallow off to one side of the quarry.

Richie’s managed to keep his glasses, clenched in one hand, but he doesn’t put them back on. Instead he sits in the waist-deep water, closes his eyes and tilts his face up to the sun like he’s trying to absorb all the light he’s been missing for weeks.

Eddie hovers, sits up on the rocks too, a combination of disinterest in frolicking in the water like the others are, and concern for Richie. He surreptitiously looks him over, cataloguing scrapes on his face and arms, and is struck again by just how _thin_ he is. He left his leather jacket at the top of the cliff with his shoes and his button-up, and weighted with water his T-shirt clings to his silhouette, highlights the disparity between the width of his shoulders and the narrowness at his middle. It almost looks like he’s drowning in his own clothes.

And despite the warmth of the sun, Richie’s started to shiver.

Eddie looks to the others. Ben and Bev are wrapped up in each other, Bev’s chin hooked over his shoulder as they tread water together. Stan and Bill seem to have eased off their small water fight, and are quietly talking while Mike floats beside them on his back, an expression of absolute relief and peace on his face.

Stretching out his leg, he pokes Stan in the back of his shoulder, and tells him when he turns to look, “Richie and I are gonna head back.”

Stan looks briefly concerned, “Is everything okay?”

“Yes. Probably. It’s fine, just-” Eddie hastens to reassure him, tilts his head towards Richie. “I think he could use a proper shower, and some rest, y’know.”

He nods. “You’re okay to take him back yourself?”

“Yeah, I got him.”

Stan smiles, and it’s the first smile since they’ve all reunited that looks completely, truly happy, born of the relief that their task is done, their oath fulfilled. “You do. Go on, then. We’ll be back soon.”

Eddie can’t help but smile back, in the face of Stan’s unadulterated contentment, nods and nudges his arm with his foot again. He turns to Richie, who’s still basking in the sun, looking almost like he’s falling asleep despite the shivers that wrack his body every few seconds. Eddie lightly nudges his arm with the knuckles of one hand, watches Richie blink and squint from the sky down to him.

“C’mon,” Eddie tugs on the sleeve of his T-shirt. “We’re going before you catch pneumonia.”

Richie shakes his head a little. “I’m fine.”

“I can hear your teeth chattering from here.” Eddie says bluntly. “And your skin’s so pale you look like an extra from the Evil Dead.”

“Well nice a’ you to notice, that’s the look I’m goin’ for.” Richie drawls, but doesn’t put up much more resistance, following Eddie back into the water.

“Whatever accent you were just going for, it’s bad.” Eddie tells him, and hides a smile when it makes Richie chuckle.

Richie looks a lot like a drowned rat, stumbling up onto the shore, one hand going to hike the sodden legs of his jeans up so he doesn’t trip over the hem, the other shoving his glasses onto his face. Eddie knows he probably doesn’t look much better, so he refrains from commenting further, and they trek up the hill back to the cliff to collect their shoes and jackets.

The walk back to the townhouse is slow, but honestly a reprieve after the frantic speed Eddie’s spent the last couple of days. He can tell it’s more of a struggle for Richie, coming down after running on adrenaline and not much else for so long. It’s a wonder how he’s not collapsed from exhaustion yet.

It’s not until they walk into the lobby that Eddie remembers the bloody mess his bathroom is likely still in, going by the lax housekeeping that the townhouse seems to boast. In the continuation of that lack of staffing, there’s no one behind the front desk, but the keys to the empty rooms are hung up on the wall on little hooks and after a brief internal debate with himself, he ducks behind the desk and snags one for the room next to his.

Richie follows him up the stairs without question, and when Eddie unlocks the room and pushes open the door he makes a beeline for the bed.

“No no no, nope, shower first.” Eddie swiftly snags him by the arm and redirects him towards the bathroom. “You are not putting sewer water and who knows what else on that bed.”

“Ugh…” Richie groans, but goes when Eddie pushes him along. “Eds, I’m literally going to fall on my ass in like, ten seconds.”

Eddie pauses at the doorway to the bathroom, considering. The bags under Richie’s eyes jump out at him, and he doesn’t think when he blurts out, “Do you need me to help you?”

Richie blinks down at him, slowly processing Eddie’s words. His mouth opens and closes before he sheepishly shakes his head, the corner of his mouth quirking up in a small smile. “Nah, I’m good. This is gonna be the first time I’ll have access to toilet paper in weeks, I need a moment alone.”

Eddie wrinkles his nose at him, gives him another small nudge into the bathroom. “You’re gross, wash up.” He shuts the door on him before he can reply.

After a small pause Eddie hears the shower start up, and he ducks to his original room to grab his suitcases and the few belongings that he’d unpacked the night before. He tries not to look too closely when he grabs his toiletry bag from the bathroom, and then he drags the whole lot over to the new room next door.

The shower’s still running, so Eddie spends a few minutes searching through one of his suitcases for some spare clothes that would fit Richie. He settles on a pair of drawstring pajama pants and a sweatshirt that’s a little large on him. With Richie’s height he might still end up with ankles and wrists showing but hopefully the clothes will be comfortable enough for the night, at least until they can get to a department store for some new things.

It occurs to him he doesn’t even know exactly how Richie got to Derry, whether he’s checked in somewhere and might have a bag of belongings sitting in the lost and found of a hotel nearby. Or even at the townhouse itself. He’ll have to ask him later.

He’s rechecking what supplies he has in his first aid kit when the water shuts off, so he gathers up the spare clothes and walks over, hand raised to knock lightly on the door.

“Richie?”

Instead of a reply, he hears the unmistakable sound of retching, and Eddie forgoes politely waiting for barging straight in.

Richie’s on his knees bent over the toilet, one hand clenched in the towel wrapped haphazardly around his waist, and his shoulders shake as he convulses, coughs and spits into the bowl.

“Shit.” Eddie hastily puts down the clothes and first aid kit on the minimal counter space next to the handbasin, hovering uncertainly behind him. “Fucking hell Richie, are you- what happened?”

Richie reaches up to flush the toilet, and then grabs a wad of tissue, wiping his mouth as he sits back on his heels. He coughs one more time into the tissue, and then flushes that too, glancing briefly up at Eddie uneasily. “Dunno, I just-” he waves a vague hand towards the glass that’s sitting by the sink, half-empty. “-I just wanted a glass of water but I guess I didn’t realise how thirsty I was.”

Some of the tension drains from Eddie’s shoulders as he realises what happened. “How much did you drink?”

“Ffffthree? Maybe four glasses?”

“You’ve not had anything substantial for weeks, of course your stomach’s not going to be used to anything.” He chastises.

“Thought we’re supposed to drink eight glasses a day or something, that’s what they’re always going on about in those infomercials-”

“Not all in one go! Fucking christ, you do realise you can literally kill yourself if you drink too much water at once-”

“I was trying to catch up-”

“It doesn’t fucking _work like that_ , asshole.” Eddie reaches down to grip Richie’s upper arm and help pull him to his feet. He’s not as annoyed as he sounds, but the bickering somehow makes everything feel a bit more normal, and it seems like Richie appreciates it if the teasing half-smile on his face is anything to go by.

Eddie makes him sits on the closed seat of the toilet, and hands him the glass of water with the stern instruction, “Sip it. _Slowly_.”

Richie rolls his eyes but does as instructed, taking an exaggeratedly small sip of water and then making a big deal of smacking his lips afterwards. Eddie ignores him, opens up his first aid kit on the side of the sink, and spends a minute taking a proper look at the state of Richie now he’s cleaned off all the grime and dirt.

A new litany of bruises have been uncovered, all in different stages of healing, leaving him with a rainbow of splotches littered over his arms and torso, down his shins and on his knees. There’s a particularly nasty-looking deep purple one tinged in yellow at his right rotator cuff, and another heavy collection across one side of his ribs. By the way his breathing expands and contracts a bit too shallowly, Eddie wonders if he might have a cracked rib, and has to fight down an instinctive swell of panic. Tells himself that if there was any possibility of a punctured lung there would have been signs long before now; a wracking cough, wheezing breath, more difficulty standing or sitting, and Richie wouldn’t be able to hide that.

He still reaches out a gentle hand, pauses briefly when Richie inhales sharply as he makes contact, and then traces as light as he can around Richie’s bruised ribcage, curves his palm around it to feel as Richie takes a slightly shaky breath in and out. There’s nothing cracked that he can feel, so it’s most likely just a nasty bruise.

His eyes drop easily to the words cut across Richie’s stomach; some of the letters are deeper than others, welled up with tiny beads of blood, but the skin looks less angry than it did before, no signs of infection or grit stuck in the skin.

It still turns his stomach to look at, reminded of letters carved into Ben’s skin as a child, and the cut of Bowers’ knife in his own cheek. The callous cruelty of it being done to Richie, while he was alone and trapped in a place that could have too easily become his tomb, the message for him alone clearly chosen to cause more pain, a branded reminder of whatever _dirty little secret_ means to him.

Richie’s hands are shaking, cupped around the glass.

He looks up at Richie’s face, but Richie’s not looking at him, doesn’t seem to be looking at anything, just staring vaguely over Eddie’s shoulder, unfocused without his glasses on. He’s slumped down, and he looks so small for someone so objectively big.

Eddie pulls his hand away from Richie’s skin, gently takes the glass out of his hands to place back on the sink. He washes his hands, grabs cotton swabs and antiseptic from the first aid kit, and crouches down in front of Richie. He pauses there, trying to meet his eye-line.

“Richie?”

Like he’s coming out of a trance, Richie takes a deep breath, and his gaze swings down to Eddie, exhaustion written deeply over his face.

Eddie gives him a hopefully reassuring smile. “I’m just gonna patch you up a bit, okay? Try not to fall asleep yet.”

Richie blinks once, slowly, but his mouth quirks up a little on one side. “Go for it, Doctor K.”

There’s a hint of an attempt at a British accent in his words, but mostly he just sounds tired. Eddie gives him a small huff of a laugh for the attempt, and sets to work cleaning Richie up.

They’re both quiet for the five or so minutes Eddie spends doing what he can with his limited supplies. Layers bruise ointment over the worst spots, checks the movement of Richie’s shoulder, placing bandaids over cuts. He uses up almost all of the gauze dressing to tape over Richie’s stomach, covering up the words and pretending not to notice how as soon as he does most of the remaining tension in Richie drains away.

He’s finishing smoothing a square bandaid over one of Richie’s knees when Richie breaks the silence.

“Wait, Eddie, you got married?”

Eddie snaps his eyes up to Richie’s at the non-sequitur, frowning. “What?”

Richie gestures a little awkwardly down to Eddie’s hands, paused on Richie’s leg, and Eddie follows his gaze to the gold band around his ring finger.

“You- you’re married.” Richie says, haltingly.

Eddie stares at the ring for a long moment. He’d honestly forgotten it was there, so used to its presence over the past fifteen years, used to the weight and the clink of it against the side of his coffee mug, but now that he’s looking at it, taking in how it looks against his skin, what it represents, it starts to feel constricting.

Then he remembers he has no reason to keep it on, anymore.

He twists the ring off, and without a second thought drops it into the small trashcan beside the sink, refusing to think anymore about it.

“No,” he says blandly, standing to pack up the first aid kit. “I’m not.”

Richie’s face does something complicated when Eddie looks over at him, squinting down at the trashcan. Eddie grabs the spare clothes he brought in for Richie and holds them out to him until he takes them.

“Get changed.” He instructs, and then leaves the bathroom, closing the door behind him.

When Richie comes out a few minutes later, Eddie can’t help the snort of laughter he lets out. He was right about the clothes being short, but he didn’t quite expect the extent of ankle and wrist on display, as well as an obvious slice of stomach between the waistband of the pants and the hem of the sweatshirt.

Richie rolls his eyes. “Yeah, yeah, yuck it up, shortstack.”

“Fuck you, I’m 5’9, that’s average height,” Eddie snaps back automatically. “You’re just-” he gestures at Richie’s whole person, “-abnormally big.”

It doesn’t help that Richie’s clearly holding his arms awkwardly away from his body, as if the upper arms of the shirt are too tight for him to let them hang normally. Every time he breaths in his chest stretches the logo on the front wide, and the hem raises to show off his stomach in a way that was vaguely amusing when he first noticed, but is decidedly less now. Eddie snaps his eyes away as he realises he’s been studying the way the clothes barely fit Richie too intently, for too long, and quickly busies himself with gathering up a change of clothes for himself.

He also shoves a nutrition bar into Richie’s hands and steers him towards the bed, pushing him down to sit with a hand on his shoulder.

“Eat the whole thing if you can,” he points to the bar, “but don’t just scoff it down all at once. Take a small bite, spend _at least_ a minute chewing it, and then wait another minute before the next bite. If you think you’re going to throw up, stop and wait for the nausea to pass, and if you are _definitely_ going to throw up, please do it in the trashcan.”

Richie looks bemused at his speech, but dutifully starts unwrapping the nutrition bar, taking a small bite and chewing slowly.

“Ish this doin’ it forya, Doctor K?” he grins through his mouthful.

“You’re a literal child.” Eddie informs him, wrinkling his nose in disgust, and turns to head for the bathroom.

He speeds through his own shower, scrubbing his hair and skin viciously with soap to get out every last remnant of the sewers. He carefully peels off the sodden gauze on his cheek and lets the water flush it out, wincing at the slight taste of old blood inside his mouth. After he towels dry and redresses in sweatpants and a T-shirt, he examines the wound in the little mirror above the sink.

Thankfully, it looks no worse for wear after being through the sewers and quarry water. The skin around it doesn’t seem overly irritated, and it seems like it’s already starting to heal on the inside when he prods lightly at it with his tongue.

Careful not to open his jaw too wide, he brushes his teeth and swills mouthwash, feels it sting against the inside of his cheek. He pats the wound dry and bandages it with what’s left in the first aid kit, making a mental note to restock when he goes to get new clothes for Richie.

Looking back to the mirror a final time, he has a brief moment of remembered panic, thinking about the identical bathroom a room over, about the shock of a blade and the terrible fear that he’d be meeting his end while standing in a bathtub.

But behind him there’s nothing but the reflection of the closed door, behind which Richie is hopefully not choking on his food, and when he meets his reflection’s gaze all he sees is his own tired eyes and a scruffy face.

He gathers up both his and Richie’s sewer-ruined clothes into a spare trash bag that he pinches from the cupboard under the sink. There’s really not much point in trying to salvage them; his own are filthy enough that it’s not worth trying to get the stains out, and Richie’s are even worse, a mess of weeks worth of bloodstains ground in dirt and torn fabric. The one thing he leaves out is Richie’s leather jacket, which somehow seems the least worse for wear, and which Eddie is hoping can be cleaned up.

When he comes out, Richie’s slumped down on the bed, limbs akimbo and glasses still on his face.

He grumbles something unintelligible when Eddie pulls him upright again by one arm, but lets himself be led back to the bathroom and brushes his teeth for all of a minute when Eddie puts a spare toothbrush into his hand.

Eddie leads him back to the bed with a hand between his shoulder blades, guides him to lie down and takes his glasses off for him, setting them on the bedside table. He straightens up, intending to go down and check if the others have come back yet, when he’s stopped by a hand suddenly closing around his wrist.

Richie’s staring up at him, and the sudden shift from the sleepy expression that’s been on his face for the last five minutes to the wide-eyed and anxious look that Eddie’s met with is jarring.

Before he can ask what’s wrong, Richie blurts out, “Can you stay with me?”

Eddie blinks down at him, and Richie shrugs his shoulders up to his ears, but keeps his loose hold on Eddie’s wrist.

“I just- I really don’t want to be alone.” He mumbles. “Please.”

And Eddie can’t say really say no, especially as he realises that he had always intended to come back up and sleep next to Richie, that he hadn’t given a second thought to sharing the bed, not wanting to let him out of his sight for too long after everything. So he gently untangles Richie’s fingers from around his wrist, walks around to the other side of the bed, and crawls on.

Once he’s shuffled down into a comfortable position on his back, he looks over at Richie, who’s turned onto his side to face Eddie. He gives him a small thankful smile, then closes his eyes and lets out a sigh.

Eddie watches him fall asleep between one breath and another, barely two minutes later, and a while after that he thinks he hears the sound of the others arriving back downstairs, murmuring conversation and the tread of feet on the staircase. He has the brief thought of ducking out, just to check, but his own exhaustion has caught up to him, and for the first time in a long time, he falls asleep without a sleeping pill.

/ / /

Eddie wakes up to Richie screaming blue murder.

He jolts out of sleep so abruptly, panic rushing through his veins that for a second he forgets where he is, half expects to see a white painted face with razor-sharp teeth coming towards him out of the darkness, strobing cold lights flashing against rock. His eyes adjust quickly, the shadowy shapes of the room coming into focus, and he turns his attention to beside him.

Richie’s got his hands clawed into the bed sheets, his whole body tense and shaking, and in the dull light Eddie can make out his face twisted up in pain, eyes scrunched closed. He lets out another yell, the sound drawn up scratchily, fighting against the way he seems to be gritting his teeth, and Eddie reaches out without a second thought, grabs Richie’s shoulders and shakes him a little, makes nonsensical shushing sounds.

Richie flinches away with a cry, struggles against the hold, thrashing and kicking out.

Eddie tries to soothe his hands along Richie’s arms, dodging them as they flail around, and exchanges shushing him for talking over Richie’s noises, hoping he’ll wake up. “Richie, hey, _hey_ , Rich-”

The door to the room flies open, and Eddie’s vaguely aware of the others racing inside, looking around for whatever supposed danger they must be expecting due to Richie’s shouts. He looks over at them helplessly, tries to communicate his own sense of loss at what to do.

One of Richie’s arms flies up and catches Eddie in the side of his face. It’s a relatively light hit, but unfortunately it’s also right over the stab wound in Eddie’s cheek, and it sends a jolt of sharp pain through him, makes him let go of Richie and reel back involuntary, a pained gasp escaping him.

Ben and Bill scramble to grab Richie’s arms, to stop him lashing out again, both talking at him themselves, variations of “calm down” and “come on, Richie”, but at the sound of their voices and the restraining hands on him Richie seems to grow even more frantic.

“No, _don’t, please!”_ he howls, screaming so loudly his voice starts going hoarse mid-sentence. “Don’t make me- guys, please, _we can still help him_ \- Eddie, _Eddie!_ ”

Eddie startles when one of Bev’s hands lands on his shoulder, holding his own palm protectively over his cheek. The sting of contact has already faded, and he can’t take his eyes off Richie, stuck so deep in some nightmare they can’t imagine.

With his arms held back, Richie twists his torso, straining forward, legs kicking against the mattress, near manic in his movements. He cries out Eddie’s name again, sounding so distraught that Eddie shoulders his way forward and gets his hands on Richie’s cheeks, grabbing him and holding his face still as he tells him desperately, “Richie, you’re okay, you’re out of there, we’re _all_ out, we killed It, it’s dead-”

Richie stops struggling abruptly at the sound of his voice, at the contact, but now that he’s closer Eddie can see the tear tracks streaming down over his cheeks, and when his eyes barely blink open, hazy and wet, Richie lets out a sob, twitching his arms like he’s trying to wrap them forward.

“Get out-” he whimpers, shaking his head from side to side, “Eddie, you gotta get out- It’s not dead, it’s not, please, I can’t lose you, _I can’t_ -”

Eddie keeps a firm grip on his face, thumbs brushing away the tears as they fall. “It _is_ dead.” He tells him firmly. “We killed It. All of us. Together, Richie. And we _all got out_.”

“Eddie-”

“You’re _safe_. Everyone’s safe, Richie.” He presses his forehead to Richie’s, trying to push the knowledge into Richie’s brain, speaks with all the assurance he can. “Richie, I _promise_.”

It takes another moment, Richie’s gaze shifting back and forth between Eddie’s eyes, but finally the words seem to sink in and the tension goes out of him all at once, leaving him sniffling and leaning his face into Eddie’s palms.

Eddie glances up to Ben and Bill, gives them a short nod, and when they let go of Richie’s arms he immediately wraps them around Eddie, clinging to the back of his shirt, and buries his face in Eddie’s shoulder.

The others slowly crowd closer, sit down on the bed, and one by one sets of arms reach around them, cocooning them in a warm embrace, petting Richie’s hair and rubbing up and down his spine.

Richie cries himself out, nearly silent, face pushed against Eddie’s clavicle and wetting the front of his T-shirt. Eventually he stops shaking, and by unspoken agreement they all shift around so they can lie on the bed together, all seven of them somehow fitting together in a tangle of limbs. It’s slightly uncomfortable but completely necessary, reassurance in the slow movement of all of them breathing, huddled close with Richie and Eddie curled together at the centre.


End file.
